Fire in Queens Apartments Leads to Rescues and Drama

By KAREEM FAHIM and MICK MEENAN

Published: May 18, 2006

A three-alarm fire leapt through a dense row of apartment buildings in Queens yesterday, injuring several firefighters, displacing 30 people and causing the roof of one of the buildings to collapse, the authorities said.

Firefighters rescued several people from the building where the fire started, and police officers at the scene pitched in, helping to reunite a distraught woman with her grandchildren, who were not hurt.

Two firefighters were taken to Elmhurst Hospital Center, said Deputy Chief Steven Kubler. ''The guys did a really good job,'' he said. ''They stretched the lines quickly, and limited the extent of the destruction.'' More than 130 firefighters responded.

Fire officials at the scene did not say what caused the fire, which started about 4:30 p.m. at 38-57 Ninth Street in Long Island City. The fire spread to the cockloft of that building, Chief Kubler said, and then jumped to the row of three-story residential buildings on either side of it.

The fire was placed under control an hour and a half after it started, leaving a mess of shattered glass, screen window frames and charred wood on the sidewalk.

The building where the fire started included densely occupied apartments, said Ezekiel Reyes, who lives in a two-bedroom apartment on the third floor with six others. He said that for two weeks, workers had been renovating the basement apartment. ''I hope they find my family a hotel or something because we don't have anywhere else to go,'' he said.

The landlord, listed in city records as Luz M. Carrillo, came to the scene last evening. When a reporter approached her, fire investigators said they wanted to speak to her first.

Mr. Reyes's brother Raymond Reyes, a mechanic who lives in 38-57 Ninth Street, said he saw the fire on television at work, then ran home and called his mother, Luz Hernandez, who works nearby. She also returned home and began searching for her two grandchildren.

Police officers located the children in a nearby deli.

The buildings that caught fire yesterday sit next door to a red-brick building used as a location in the television show ''Rescue Me,'' about a New York City firehouse.

Photo: A fire that started at 38-57 Ninth Street in Long Island City quickly spread to other attached homes yesterday. Several firefighters were injured. (Photo by Uli Seit for The New York Times)